Product Details

• Actors: Dipankar Dey, Mamata Shankar, Bikram Bhattacharya, Utpal Dutt, Dhritiman Chatterjee
• Directors: Satyajit Ray
• Writers: Satyajit Ray
• Producers: Satyajit Ray, Daniel Toscan du Plantier, Gérard Depardieu
• Format: Color, Subtitled, NTSC
• Subtitles: English
• Rated: NR (Not Rated)
• Number of tapes: 1
• Studio: First Run Features
• VHS Release Date: March 10, 1998
• Run Time: 97 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• ASIN: 6304326319
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #284,447 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Editorial Reviews

From The New Yorker

The last movie by the Bengali filmmaker Satyajit Ray is a modest picture, a graceful domestic comedy made in a serene, leisurely classical style. A middle-class Calcutta couple, Anila and Sudhindra Bose (played by Mamata Shankar and Deepankar De), receive an unexpected visit from a man claiming to be Anila's long-lost uncle Manmohan Mitra, who left India for Europe in 1955 and has never returned. Mitra (Utpal Dutt) is a charming, erudite, and not particularly threatening middle-aged man, but the Boses can't resolve their doubts about his identity. This movie, like each of Ray's twenty-seven previous features, doesn't announce itself immediately: both its style and its story are based on the principle that knowledge of people can be acquired only gradually and tentatively, by means of a patient accumulation of intimate experiences. His films require us to live with his characters for a while before we decide who they really are. Ray's manner here is unusually direct and plainspoken: there are a handful of awkward moments in which he seems to be lecturing the audience on the shallowness of contemporary society. This is a lovely, flawed movie rather than a great one, but if we listen closely and wait until the end before making up our minds about it we can still hear in it the voice of a great artist. In Bengali. -Terrence Rafferty
Copyright © 2006 The New Yorker

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

23 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Master's last but not the least!, June 9, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: The Stranger [VHS] (VHS Tape)

Many may overlook this film by the legendary Ray because films such as The Apu Trilogy seem to define him to a lot of people. In this, his last offering, Ray deals with his favorite subject- human nature- and presents it in a marvelous way. The film deals with a family which is visited by a long lost uncle of the wife. The family members are doubtful of the identity of this very well-humored and knowledgeable gentleman though he doesn't seem to threaten their lives in any way. The general mistrust in humanity in these days becomes evident in this film. Brilliantly acted by Utpal Dutt(I think this was his last film as well) and the others, this film is thoroughly enjoyable.

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars remarkably engrossing drama, June 5, 2001

By 

W. K. Miller "kenmiller32" (NC, USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Stranger [VHS] (VHS Tape)

A well-to-do- Indian family is paid a visit by the supposedly long-lost uncle of the wife. His passport reads "M. Mitra." But is he a relative? Her husband doubts whether Mitra is really her uncle. She doubts it also, but is frightful of being unhospitable to her own uncle. They agonize over what to do-- how to treat this man, when he may be a dear relative, away from the family for 35 years, and he may be a fraud.

It's been done many times in many movies; the stranger comes into a family and disrupts the quiet domestic life with his foreign ways, his "differentness," but in this potent drama, director Ray injects the question of identity. Is M. Mitra who he says he is? And even if he is, what are his motives? The plot of Agantuk is very simple, but the movie asks the viewer to reconsider how he sees strangers in his society. The setting and characters are of India, but the themes of the movie are universal.

Utpal Dutt is wonderful as M. Mitra, the stranger.

Robi Ghosh is also sensational-- knee-slappingly funny as a family friend who begs to visit so he can slyly question M. Mitra, to determine his authenticity.

Mamata Shankar plays the role of the mother/wife with understated grace, until late in the movie. Then she brings the movie a great deal of heart, in a scene where she openly grieves about the way her family has treated M. Mitra. The scene is touching without being mawkish.

If you love great cinema and gripping drama, rent or buy Agantuk (The Stranger). It goes for your heart and your brain.

ken32

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The last work of a genius, August 3, 2002

By 

greatbong "greatbong" (Stony Brook, NY United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Stranger [VHS] (VHS Tape)

Satyajit Ray's last bow. And no doubt one of his finest.The movie, like most of Satyajit Ray's classics, operates on many levels. On one level, it is an endearing story of a long lost uncle who comes back after many years and throws a typical middle class household into disarray. Is he for real or an imposter ? On the other level, it is a movie about our basic conceptions of civilization, and of our myopic tendency to compartmentalize the world into "family" and "strangers".

Unlike some of Ray's later works, this movie does not become preachy or unduly morose..rather there is a subtle strain of humor that runs through the entire movie .

Acting-wise, Utpal Dutt, in his last role also, gives us the performance of a lifetime. This movie is all Utpal Dutt and there is noone who could have done justice to the role other than him. The supporting cast is stellar comprising some of the best actors of Bengali cinema. And throughout the movie, the technical polish and consummate artistry that is the stamp of a Ray movie is embellished in each shot.

Great till the very end... the only regret is that we will never see movie making like this again.